1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the instructional equipment and, more particularly, to a realistically performing device for training individuals to utilize a telephone.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The importance of the telephone in today's world is well estalished. Consequently, it is important for children to be able to use the telephone at an early age, not only to facilitate day-to-day activities, but also the seek assistance in an emergency. Similar considerations also apply to mentally or physically handicapped individuals.
Attempts have been made to provide instructional equipment for training individuals to use the telephone, but such devices have been extremely limited, principally because they do not realistically simulate use of an actual telephone. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 2,973,586 issued to Robertson discloses a telephone training device in which a pair of telephones are connected to a central control console which provides dial tone, busy signal and ring output to the telephones when specific push buttons are manually actuated. Communication between the two telephones is achieved simply by picking up both telephone handsets. Thus, the Robertson training device is only capable of simulating the operation of a telephone after a telephone number is correctly dialed, but is utterly incapable of training an individual to dial a telephone number correctly.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,715,520 issued to Lambrou illustrates a telephone dialing apparatus in which a code card sequentially illuminates a lamp beneath one of the digits of the dial to indicate which digit should be dialed to enter the telephone number coded onto the card. This device, of course, does not realistically simulate an actual telephone since telephone numbers are communicated to a student either visually or orally and not be illuminating lamps positioned adjacent the correct digits.
Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 3,878,623 issued to Leff discloses a telephone teaching device in which each of the digits is coded with a particular symbol. The student is instructed to dial a specific telephone number by inserting a strip selectively coded with the symbols into the telephone. Once again, this device does not provide realistic telephone training.
The effectiveness of conventional telephone training devices, including those discussed above, is also limited by their failure to recognize the limited attention span of children and mentally handicapped individuals. In order for a telephone teaching device to be effective, it must provide immediate reward for correctly dialing a number, yet allow a student to continue his attempts to dial the number until the number is correctly dialed. Also, the device should provide some measure of the enjoyment to the student since enjoyable learning is invariably effective learning. None of the conventional telephone training device exhibit these characteristics.